Languedoc 435marriage. After the conquest in 1066, William called him
to England in 1070 to be the archbishop of CANTERBURY
after the deposition of his Anglo-Saxon predecessor, Sti-
gand (d. 1072). Lanfranc got into a controversy with the
archbishop of YORKover which see was the primary one
for England. Lanfranc won, but the papal documents he
used in favor of Canterbury were forgeries.
He was a careful archbishop, recognizing his poor
knowledge of the language and customs of the country.
An ardent reformer, he became well known at the same
time for his spirit of compromise in matters of ecclesias-
tical policy within the strange new legal situation that
followed the conquest of England. Despite Pope GRE-
GORY VII’s prohibition of priestly MARRIAGE and lay
INVESTITURES, Lanfranc did not enforce CELIBACYon the
CLERGYof England and permitted the intervention of the
Crown in ceremonial procedures in the appointments of
ecclesiastical officials. He acted as regent at the death of
William and helped with the succession of WILLIAMII
RUFUSto the throne. Lanfranc died at Canterbury on
May 24, 1089.
See alsoFORGERY; GREGORIAN REFORM.
Further reading:Lanfranc, The Letters of Lanfranc,
Archbishop of Canterbury,ed. and trans. Helen Clover
and Margaret Gibson (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1979);
Lanfranc, The Monastic Constitutions of Lanfranc,trans.
David Knowles (London: Thomas Nelson and Sons,
1951); Frank Barlow, The English Church: A History of
the Anglo-Norman Church (London: Longman, 1979);
Margaret T. Gibson, Lanfranc of Bec(Oxford: Clarendon
Press, 1978); A. J. Macdonald, Lanfranc: A Study of His
Life, Work and Writing (London: Oxford University
Press, 1926).
Langland, William(ca. 1330–ca. 1400) cleric, poet
William was probably born in Worcestershire or Shrop-
shire near the Welsh marches in about 1330. He probably
lived in LONDONand was married. He had taken minor
orders but his marriage barred him from the priesthood.
Well educated and familiar with theological ideas, he
reputedly wrote three versions of The Vision Concerning
Piers Plowman.It is an allegorical and complex poem and
dream written in Middle English that dealt with the pur-
suit of salvation. William was clearly familiar with the
political, religious, and social problems and questions of
the 1380s in ENGLAND, especially of poverty, and includ-
ing the English PEASANTREBELLIONof 1381, the parlia-
mentary crises of the later years of Kings EDWARDIII and
RICHARDII, and the heretical views of the LOLLARDS.He
died about 1400.
See alsoSEVEN DEADLY OR CAPITAL SINS; VISIONS AND
DREAMS.
Further reading:William Langland, Piers the Plow-
man,trans. J. F. Goodridge (Harmondsworth: Penguin
Classics, 1959); David Aers, Chaucer, Langland, and the
Creative Imagination (London: Routledge and Kegan
Paul, 1980); Charlotte Brewer, Editing Piers Plowman:
The Evolution of the Text(Cambridge: Cambridge Univer-
sity Press, 1996); Derek Pearsall, An Annotated Critical
Bibliography of Langland (Ann Arbor: University of
Michigan Press, 1990).Langton, Stephen SeeSTEPHENLANGTON.Languedoc The word Languedoc in the late 13th
century, in the acts of the royal administration, desig-
nated the region in southern France that spoke a dialect
of French called langue d’oc.It had become part of the
kingdom of FRANCEaccording to the terms of the treaty
of PARISin 1229 during the ALBIGENSIANCRUSADEand
after the death of the count of Poitiers and Toulouse, the
brother of LOUISIX, Alphonse of Poitiers, in 1271. This
region formed the three medieval administrative areas
or counties of Beaucaire, Carcassonne, and Toulouse
(whose borders then did not correspond to their modern
equivalents).HISTORY
Languedoc abounded in Roman structures, with towns
that stayed prosperous and were centers of government
in the late antique world. This prosperous part of south-
ern Gaul was first conquered by the VISIGOTHSbut was
soon split into the kingdom of AQUITAINEand the north-
ern march of the kingdom of TOLEDO, or Septimania.
After a brief Muslim occupation in the first half of the
eighth century, the region was retaken by the FRANKS.
Muslims from Iberia continued to raid but never stayed.
The land was divided into counties and viscounties, at
whose head Visigothic or Frankish dynasties maintained
a precarious existence. Languedoc grew into a region
dominated by great monasteries, fortified settlements
around seigniorial CASTLES, and growing towns full of
active MERCHANTS.SALTand WINEwere important parts
of this prosperity. An important school of legal studies
grew up at MONTPELLIER. Languedocian merchants, from
Marseille, dealt with PISA,GENOA, and CATALONIA,as
well as conducting business at the FAIRSof Champagne
to the north.ALBIGENSIAN CRUSADE AND DECLINE
All this came under attack when the Albigensian Cru-
sades began in the 13th century. Over a period of
decades, armies of crusaders, initially led by SIMON DE
MONTFORT THEELDER, overran the region. They were
accompanied by the newly founded MENDICANT ORDERS
and the INQUISITION. This situation soon evolved into a
conquest of southern France by northern France. The ini-
tial pretense for this outside intervention, the CATHARSor
ALBIGENSIANS, put up a strong resistance alongside their
nonheretical neighbors. By the time of King Louis IX in